Tag Archives: Sexuality

Misery is like a tickle. And tickles are fun, like
a laugh, or like running with the wind for awhile.
This I believed before I was an old fat man, and knew
To roll my eyes at human contact, like other adults.

I still remember poison oak (never poison ivy Out
West), and how its seductive red leafy tri-lobed Evil
Was lurking in the forest and caused kids to stray
Through the underbrush. It was sinister, I swear.

Misery loves company most if kids are miserable. We
Were itchy, and cotton-clad, and smelled of acids and
Calamine lotion. If it bursts, it’ll spread to us,
Said adults, eternally fearful of a kinder-rupture.

At school, you’d lose a week of Physical Education.
You’d be sidelined while all your friends–and a
Few enemies–scrambled sweating up and down the
Basketball Court. Boils stick on balls, you see.

Misery is not touching yourself, especially if you’d
Just learned how to do it properly. Awed preteen boys
Spoke in whispers of the one, like us, who scratched
Down there, and it shriveled away. Have mercy, Lord!

So they provided us with a nightly regime of mossy
Green pumice soap, and a chance to bare your body to
The woodporch spiders, and toss your itch-infected
Clothes into a scalding laundry. A fat lot of good.

Like this:

A week ago Sunday, our church had its annual picnic at Mason Lake. Very unusually, it was hot, close to 90 degrees after servcies and the sun reached its zenith. We trooped out, enjoyed the sunshine, ate our fill and fellowshiped.

For decades, I’ve known about the Frank Zappa album Weasels Ripped My Flesh. I’ve never listened to any of its tracks, but weasel, being the most hilarious of the mink family, and the flesh-ripping–well, let’s just say that the title itself caught my attention.

What I didn’t know until recently was how Zappa came by the title: apparently a friend and devotee discovered the magazine cover to the left, and gave it to Mr. Zappa. He passed the magazine off to a cover artist called Neon Park, and said “Think you can do better?” The famous (and controversial) album cover is below as well.

Like this:

A handful of people in my life know this story. As part of my quest to write honesty into every word I publish, and more particularly to give my readers the kind of openness they deserve in a writer, I’ll put this fact in as broad a forum as I’m able: as a preschooler, I was sexually assaulted.